The Coppell Farmers Market will be celebrating Food Day by focusing on youth and nutrition at the farmers market on October 19th. This will be the third year the Coppell Farmers Market has joined in with many across the nation in a celebration of healthy, affordable, and sustainable food by targeting nutrition at “Food Day for Kids”. This year, there will be a variety of kid-friendly, hands-on activities all morning, 8am to noon.
The Coppell Farmers Market is partnering with Coppell Independent School District’s Nutrition Culinary Trainer, Helen Duran. Chef Helen has a degree in history, but has always had a passion for food, as a teacher of all things gastronomical, chef, and even a judge at the Texas State Fair. “Everyone loves Chef Helen!” exclaimed Lilly Balsamo, CHS Representative on the Coppell Community Garden Board of Directors, when she heard that Chef Helen will be at Food Day for Kids. Chef Helen’s vision aligns with Food Day, that it is right that everyone have access to nutritious, sustainably grown food. Come to Chef Helen’s booth throughout the morning and see what she is cooking up!
To continue the theme of encouraging kids to learn to cook and eat whole foods, Victoria Hooker of Two Chefs, better known as the chips and salsa vendor, will have a booth for kids, “eating from the rainbow”. Victoria was just appointed the Executive Chef of SMU, but will be bringing along her culinary students from her previous work as Professional Chef at Le Cordon Bleu School of Culinary Arts to help with the kid’s booth at the farmers market on October 19th.
With all the encouragement to eat real food, the Coppell Farmers Market is the place to buy it locally. There will also be kid- size portions for sale at several of the farmers and producers booths throughout the market and go to the CFM’s website for an online kid’s recipe booklet at www.coppellfarmersmarket.org.
Food Day aims to encourage awareness and action leading to a system of healthy, affordable food produced in a sustainable, humane way. By doing this event, the Coppell Farmers Market is working “with people around the country to create thousands of events in homes, schools, churches, farmers markets, city halls, and state capitals,” according to the Food Day website at www.foodday.org. For our area children, the Coppell market is particularly targeting the first and fifth of the Six Food Day Principles: to reduce diet-related disease by promoting safe, healthy foods, and promote health by curbing junk-food marketing to kids. Former Surgeon General David Satcher says, “Food Day is an opportunity for us – families, schools, communities – to begin to habituate our children to healthy eating.”
The Coppell Farmers Market is open each Saturday from 8AM until noon in Old Town Coppell at 793 S. Coppell Rd. Lone Star Electronic Benefit Transfer (EBT) and bank ATM cards can be used to purchase wooden market tokens at the picnic tables and used like cash at the Coppell Farmers Market vendor booths. More information is available at www.coppellfarmersmarket.org